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College Media Review, the flagship journal of College Media Association, Inc., is the leading academic journal on advising collegiate media, both print and electronic. CMR is a comprehensive journal for popular and refereed articles serving collegiate media advisers.

The style guide website notes it is a project of the Center for Integration and Improvement of Journalism, based at the Journalism Department at San Francisco State University, and says, in part: “The center’s mission is to make journalism more inclusive from the classroom to the newsroom. An earlier version of The Diversity Style Guide was produced in the 1990s by CIIJ’s News Watch Program with help from many journalism organizations.”

The website includes the updated Diversity Style Guide, as well as several others:

Environmental journalism training ebbs and flows with political fortunes

By Carol Terrracina HartmanCMR Co-Managing Editor

A professional myth pervades the field of environmental journalism, but likely has some basis in fact: when a Democrat holds the White House, the jobs for environmental journalists evaporate: here come the pink slips. But when a Republican has the White House, it’s major job creation: every media outlet staffs up on environmental and science writers.

The unspoken perception is that the environment is a partisan issue and therefore safe to ignore at certain times, thus requiring less reporting. What that says for journalists, is that it becomes harder to report and publish on environmental issues because editors and media outlets perceive that the environment is “safe”: a crisis can’t occur.

Ethical issues aside, where does that leave undergraduate science writing programs? If opportunity to report potentially ebbs and flows every four years, how do professors plan curriculum and attract students to the programs?

A panel hosted at the Society of Environmental Journalists conference in Sacramento September 2016, addressed the best practices for teaching science and environmental reporting. A common theme emerged among the speakers: interdisciplinary approach.

College views on transition of power

Editor’s Note: This is the second set of links College Media Review is publishing related to Donald Trump’s inauguration, the women’s march, and visits college journalists had with professional journalists while in Washington, D.C. Also included are links from college.usatoday.com to inauguration coverage, including voices from college Republicans explaining why they voted for Donald Trump.

An Analysis of Federal Student Press Law Cases at the University Level

By David R. WheelerThe University of Tampa

Although some student press advocates are concerned about recent decisions curtailing the speech and press rights of college students, First Amendment protections for postsecondary school students are on much firmer footing than are protections for K-12 students.

The 1960 and 1970s: Students and Editorial Control

The birth of college press freedom began even before Tinker, when an Alabama federal district court in 1967 ruled in favor of a student editor in Dickey v. Alabama State Board of Education. In Dickey, a disagreement over content in the student newspaper resulted in student editor Gary Dickey’s suspension from Troy State University.[1] Dickey wrote an editorial commenting on the governor and state legislature’s insistence that no articles be published that were critical of them. The president of the university, Dr. Frank Rose, disagreed with this policy, and Dickey wanted to write an article supporting the president. As the court noted:

It is without controversy in this case that the basis for the denial of Dickey’s right to publish his editorial supporting Dr. Rose was a rule that had been invoked at Troy State College to the effect that there could be no editorials written in the school paper which were critical of the Governor of the State of Alabama or the Alabama Legislature. The rule did not prohibit editorials or articles of a laudatory nature concerning the Governor or the Legislature.[2]

Dickey was told by his adviser that he could not publish the column. Instead, Dickey decided to run a blank space in place of the article with the word “censored.” For this action, Dickey was suspended, and he subsequently took his case to federal court, claiming a violation of his First Amendment rights. In ordering that Dickey be allowed to return to the school, the district court judge said: Continue reading Research (Vol. 54) — Don’t Press the Panic Button Yet

Heartening news about quality journalism as a business model—and how print and broadcast media can team for investigative ‘solutions reporting’

Quality journalism is a “viable business model,” according to Washington Post publisher Fred Ryan. In a memo sent to Post employees earlier this month, Ryan cited increasing digital ad revenue and subscriptions as among the examples, and said the Post planned to hire more staff in 2017.

From left, Xinyi Zhou and Yining Wang, from International Department at Hangzhou No. 14 High School, in the Zhejiang province of eastern China, meet with Julian Parrott, associate dean of the College of Media at the University of Illinois during the JEA China conference at Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou, China, on Aug. 4, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 1

Kaifu Xiao, from the International Department at Wuhan No. 6 High School in Hubei Province, Central China, asks a question during the JEA China conference at Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou, China, on Aug. 4, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 2

Students from JEA China prepare for interviews during a field trip to Shanghai on Aug. 3, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 4

Students prepare for a field trip to Shanghai during the JEA China conference at Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou, China, on Aug. 3, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 5

Students prepare to depart for a field trip to Shanghai during the JEA China conference on Aug. 3, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 6

Multimedia journalist Xiaoran Liu answers questions from students after screening her documentary “Crossroads of Journalism Dreams,” during the JEA China conference at Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou, China, on Aug. 4, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 7

Duke Kunshan University, site of the JEA China conference, on Aug. 5, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 8

Kelly Furnas teaches newswriting to students during the JEA China conference at Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou, China, on Aug. 4, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 9

Kelly Furnas teaches newswriting to students during the JEA China conference at Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou, China, on Aug. 4, 2016.

High School Outreach in China 10

Kelly Furnas, left, meets with a student during the JEA China conference at Duke Kunshan University in Suzhou, China, on Aug. 4, 2016.

Reflections on an inaugural high school journalism conference

By Kelly FurnasElon University

Amid a backdrop of international language barriers, governmental censorship and an educational system that devalues creative thinking, Chinese high school students still learned about journalism through an inaugural national high school conference.

“Generally there is a surging trend for more popularity of right-brain subjects.” -- Zhu Lin, Youth Impact China

The conference, held earlier this year, was organized by JEA China, an affiliate member of the Journalism Education Association headquartered in the United States. The conference included U.S. and Chinese presenters.

JEA China — an affiliate member of the Journalism Education Association headquartered in the United States — is hoping to capitalize on those obstacles by providing programming tailored for high school students hoping to study in the West.

Zhu Lun, one of the architects for JEA China’s conference, as well as the organization itself, is chief executive officer of a nonprofit organization called Youth Impact China, which he started in 2015 to provide extracurricular programming for high school students in subjects such as business, finance, biology, art, design and journalism. Continue reading Bringing American-style journalism to Chinese high school students

Colleges urged to end retaliation against journalists and advisers

By Chris EvansChair, CMA First Amendment Advocacy Committee

Most advisers eventually get The Question.

Click above to download report

It might come in a call or an email. Or a passing comment from a colleague in the hallway. Not infrequently, it first appears in the anxious look of an editor-in-chief who’s found herself on the receiving end of a tirade by a college administrator.

This particular question often serves as an opening salvo in a confrontation over something as frivolous as a bawdy sex column or as journalistically significant as an investigation into a provost’s drunken junket to Jamaica.

If you were reading only The New York Times during the 2016 presidential election, you can be forgiven if you held a well-founded belief that Hillary Clinton would win the election by a landslide. On Tuesday, Nov. 8 at 10:20 p.m., Election Day, The New York Times predicted a Clinton victory by 85%, “based on the latest state and national polls.”

There is surely a lot of soul-searching going on at The New York Times and elsewhere.

The same holds true if you were reading many college newspapers around the country this fall. Millenials (adults ages 18-35) did in fact vote strongly for Clinton, and their preferences were reflected in stories they reported for their school media. My own students submitted story after story reflecting an inherent Clinton bias.